2024/079: Normal Rules Don't Apply — Kate Atkinson

No matter how hard she tried to keep them at bay, every new beginning [of the universe] led to the same old end – people. They always came back. Unlike everything else, they couldn’t be got rid of. [loc. 2620]

A collection of eleven stories, some more connected than others. We start with 'The Void', which takes place in 2028 and threatens humanity as we know it: much later, in 'Gene-sis', we encounter God's sister, Kitty, who's juggling reboots of the universe (they start with a 'ting!' and the smell of violets) and her job in advertising. En route, there are several iterations of a chap named Franklin (actually his middle name) who is given a racing tip by a talking horse; who becomes engaged to Connie (short for Constance) and finds her sisters predatory; who was writing a novel called What If, an infinitely recursive exploration of diverging timelines; who meets a fairytale princess, Aoife, who's lost her way home... Some of the stories (like the 'talking toys' dystopia of 'Existential Marginalisation' or the doomed romance of a Hollywood starlet and a British prince) don't seem to fit with the others, but even then there's the soft sound of a bell, and the scent of violets ... or at least a stuffed toy named Violet.

I couldn't help feeling that there was a novel hidden inside there, waiting to get out. Franklin would be in it, and Aoife, and the delightful Florence, the vicar's daughter (‘Did you just use the F word, Florence?’ her father asked mildly. ‘I am the F word,’ Florence muttered.). And there would be fewer loose ends and unresolved fates. What did happen to Mrs Peacock? What was Pamela's horrible past? Why did Mandy's afterlife look like wallpaper?

I do love Atkinson's prose but I don't think these stories are anything like her best work.

I remembered reading Atkinson's previous collection of short stories Not the End of the World and can see from my review that it shares some characters and elements with Normal Rules Don't Apply -- Hawk, Green Acres... Maybe time to reread that earlier book and see what other connections are revealed -- and whether it changes my perception of this later work.